A Micro View of Design Reasoning: Two-Way Shifts Between Embodiment and Rationale

Abstract

This chapter is based on the assumption that because designing (of tangible artifacts) is aimed at specifying configurations and properties of entities, designers must manipulate forms and shapes and they must resort to visual reasoning to do so. Visual reasoning in designing is seen as the interplay between two modes of reasoning: embodiment and rationale, such that the one supports and continues the other in order to arrive at a result that is novel and valid in terms of all the requirements it is to satisfy. We use protocol analysis to explore the bond between embodiment and rationale reasoning modes at two levels of cognitive operation – that of the design move and that of the argument that is its building block. We conclude that the two modes of reasoning are equi-present in designing; they describe a binary system characterized by high-frequency shifts between embodiment and rationale.